


Wuxian The Ninth

by spockandawe



Category: The Locked Tomb Trilogy | Gideon the Ninth Series - Tamsyn Muir, 魔道祖师 - 墨香铜臭 | Módào Zǔshī - Mòxiāng Tóngxiù
Genre: Canon-Typical Ending, Canon-Typical Self-Harm, Canon-Typical Violence, Crossover, M/M, Necromancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-09
Updated: 2020-08-03
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:16:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 13,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24633700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spockandawe/pseuds/spockandawe
Summary: ADDRESSING THE HOUSE OF THE THIRD, ITS FIRST LORD JIANG FENGMIAN, AND ITS FIRST LADY YU ZIYUAN:Salutations to the House of the Third, and blessings upon its tombs, its peaceful dead, and its manifold mysteries.The Emperor Undying, the First Reborn, begs this house to honor its love for the Creator, as set in the contract of tenderness made on the day of the Resurrection, and humbly asks for the first fruits of your household.For in need now are the Emperor's Hands, the most blessed and beloved of the Emperor Undying, the faithful and the everlasting! The Emperor calls now for postulants to the position of Lyctor, heirs to the eight stalwarts who have served these ten thousand years: as many of them now lie waiting for the rivers to rise on the day they wake to their Emperor, those lonely Guard remaining petition for their numbers to be renewed and their Lord above Lords to find eight new liegemen.
Relationships: Lán Zhàn | Lán Wàngjī/Wèi Yīng | Wèi Wúxiàn
Comments: 14
Kudos: 46





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Fair warning, familiarity with both these properties is probably necessary to follow along with what's happening in the story. Gideon The Ninth is much too tightly plotted for me to trace its footsteps exactly without shameless plagiarizing, which wouldn't be fun for any of us. So the beginning of my story is written, the end is written, and the middle will be less filled in than the original novel. The letters and prayers in the description and story are sampled nearly verbatim, but other than that, I'd like to write my own thing. My lofty literary goal is as follows: What if I took the gay necromancers from one fictional property... and replaced them with a different set of gay necromancers. I seriously doubt that a story called The Grandmaster Of Necromantic Cultivation starring Harrowhark Nonagesimus is to follow, but I want to at least cross these stories over _once_ while the inspiration is flowing.
> 
> [Tumblr](https://spockandawe.tumblr.com/tagged/wuxian%20the%20ninth/chrono)/[Twitter](https://twitter.com/spockandawe/status/1270500019104350208)

Receiving a letter from the Emperor Undying, the lord of the nine houses, is undoubtedly a surprise. That it causes a fight is maybe… less so.

If you’re going to have a loud noisy argument, a letter from the Emperor seems like a decent enough excuse. After all, how often do you get an opportunity like this? You’re lucky you don’t have to pay as much attention to politics as your siblings, because it’s a struggle to force yourself to care, but you’re  _ fairly  _ sure the Emperor hasn’t communicated with the Third House since… oh, before you were born? The First Lady of the House spoke with him once when you were still young, but she’d taken a shuttle out to his Cohort warship to seek an audience with him, which isn’t really the same thing as him deciding out of nowhere to send your House a letter.

Unfortunately, you’ve gotten distracted enough trying to piece the timeline together that you fail to realize until it’s too late that you’ve been staring at First Lady Yu.

She glares at you, her hand on the hilt of her rapier, and snaps, “Do you have something to say,  _ Wei  _ Wuxian?”

You know better than to rise to bait like that, especially with that pointed emphasis on your family name, so you just bow your head over your food again, polite and deferential. You feel her eyes on you for a moment longer before she turns to the others and addresses them again.

For a lack of anything better to do, you reach out and pick up the Emperor’s letter again, rubbing your fingers over the folds in the actual, literal paper.

_ “ADDRESSING THE HOUSE OF THE THIRD, ITS FIRST LORD JIANG FENGMIAN, AND ITS FIRST LADY YU ZIYUAN: _

_ “Salutations to the House of the Third, and blessings upon—” _

Lady Yu’s voice rises in a sharp question, and you put the letter down again, watching the rest of your family from the corner of your eye.

Finally, Jiang Fengmian sighs and says, “The Emperor asks that we send our heir.”

Lady Yu starts to speak again, but Jiang Yanli interrupts her, speaking softly. “I would be honored to have the opportunity to serve the emperor as one of his Lyctors.”

You steal a better look at shijie. She looks unhappy, and she looks tired. Not really surprising, but it’s still difficult to see her like that without doing something to help.

More level now, Lady Yu says, “So you think we should send her, without a care for her constitution? For her health?”

Shijie doesn’t wince, but her eyes drop to look at the table, and she stays like that, not responding. It’s not a very subtle euphemism. You can’t help chiming in. “Who do you think the Seventh will send?”

Your brother and sister both give you warning looks for that one, but Madam Yu is already rounding on you. “Why should I care for the Seventh? Do you place their concerns above the concerns of your own House?” 

You shrug, but she doesn’t wait for your response before turning to Jiang Cheng. You can see him brace himself, his jaw clenched tight.

“Jiang Cheng,” she says.

He responds, “It would be an honor to serve the Third’s heir as her cavalier primary.”

Lady Yu glares. “You would take both my children from me at once?”

“Mother,” he begins.

“Do you lack the courage to offer yourself to the Emperor as a necromancer of the Third House? To serve him as a Lyctor?”

Jiang Cheng’s voice is quiet, but strained. “I am not as skilled an adept as Jiang Yanli.”

Lady Yu studies him for a moment. “Skilled, no. But— Are you as strong? As  _ powerful?  _ What could you accomplish if you were to apply yourself?”

He drops his head, staring at the table. He says, “I have applied myself as a cavalier, and would be honored to serve the Emperor—or his chosen—as such.”

Shijie isn’t reacting, but you can see the little ways she droops further and further as the conversation goes on. Madam Yu is already drawing herself up to reply, and on an impulse, you interrupt.

“I wouldn’t mind going,” you say.

Everyone at the table is staring at you now. Shijie looks sad and worried, Jiang Cheng looks angry and worried, and Lady Yu just looks angry, which is about what you’d expected.

Jiang Fengmian says, consideringly, “That might work.”

It does not work. But now Lady Yu is yelling at you instead of upsetting your siblings, so you happily offer to serve as necromancer with Jiang Cheng as your cavalier, or to serve as cavalier to Jiang Yanli instead, and you ignore her cutting remarks about how shameless it is to pursue this honor offered to the Third House in place of the children actually born to the Third.

Nothing is resolved that night, or the next, or the next. But the arguments can’t go on forever, not when the Emperor is waiting on the Third House’s reply. Lady Yu is unwilling to offer anyone outside her family the opportunity to become an undying servant of the Emperor. And she isn’t able to persuade Jiang Cheng to supplant shijie.

And, not that it does any good, but you do repeat your offers to take either of their places. Necromantic theory has always come easily to you—from what Jiang Fengmian says, your mother must have started teaching you the basics when you were a toddler—and once Jiang Cheng started training as a cavalier, of  _ course  _ you joined in as often as you were able to manage. You could do a creditable job in either position, you think. You’re pretty brilliant that way.

On the other hand, Madam Yu cares more that your mother left the Ninth House, and when she arrived planetside, promptly persuaded your father to formally renounce the Third House and run away with her. Wei Changze was a Third House cavalier from a long line of Third cavaliers, which has  _ absolutely  _ no effect on Madam Yu’s opinion of you, but it has been very, very useful in persuading the instructors who still remember your father to give you whatever weapons training you ask for.

Jiang Cheng doesn’t want to talk about this, and you aren’t going to make shijie talk about this unless she brings it up herself, but you do plenty of thinking about the situation on your own. By the time the Emperor sends another letter, with instructions, the directive of  _ ‘no servants, no retainers;  _ isn’t  _ actually  _ that much of a disappointment.

You mean… you were already planning to stow away.

The three months before your siblings are supposed to leave go by in a blur of training and planning. Nobody knows what to expect at the First House, but everyone is pushing them to prepare as hard as possible. You let shijie study in peace, though you join her for most days, at least for a little while. You dig up what interesting books you can find from the library and bring them to show her when it seems like she needs a break. You’re positive she’ll do well—she might not be as strong as you or Jiang Cheng, but there’s nothing  _ wrong  _ with her skills, and she’s smarter than anyone gives her credit for—but there’s no harm in showing her unusual proofs, or the notes ancient adepts took in the margins of the textbooks.

Jiang Cheng is being  _ personally  _ trained by Madam Yu, so you spend much less time with him, except when she wants him to have a sparring partner. He’s fighting sword and chain, obviously, just like her— But you’re there on the day she hands him her own weapons, passed down through her mother and grandfather. You slip back into the shadows a little bit, watching, because you’re sure it won’t end well if you draw her attention at a time like this. And after that, no matter what she’s thinking, there are fewer pointed remarks about exactly which child is going to represent the Third as a necromancer.

Jiang Fengmian plans a trip for you, to visit the Sixth House’s largest university. It’s obviously a consolation prize for being left behind while your siblings leave, and you smile and nod, and as the day of departure gets closer, you commandeer several trunks’ worth of recently-deceased bones from the local academy. 

There’s plenty of bustle and confusion about exactly what to pack for the trip, and it’s not terribly hard to slip your special trunks into the mix. There’s confusion over what clothes to bring, what books, what other supplies— You’re fairly sure the Emperor is planning to  _ feed  _ his Lyctors, but you wouldn’t know it from how much food gets packed for the shuttle. By the time Lady Yu is done, you’re more worried about being able to  _ fit  _ your trunks into the shuttle to begin with, but it gets managed.

Honestly, the only difficult part is slipping away from the farewell ceremony and onto the shuttle without anyone noticing, but there’s enough confusion and excitement that you manage it. There’s no pilot there in person, it’s being done remotely, and servants are in and out of the shuttle right up until the scheduled departure. So you say your goodbyes—shijie tells you to be good while they’re gone, and you  _ just  _ manage not to burst out laughing—and then slip into the shuttle yourself while Jiang Fengmian makes a speech.

From there, it’s just a matter of popping open your trunks to spill a little blood on the packed bones before shutting them again, finding space behind a stack of trunks, and as the shuttle lifts off, you reach for the last  _ little  _ hint of thanergic energy in your bones and use it to mask your own thalergic signature.

It burns itself out within a couple minutes, but that’s all you needed. You can hear your siblings talking quietly on the other side of the crates, and really, what’s the point of sitting in a boring hiding spot for any longer than you need to?

When shijie sees you, she covers her mouth and stares at you, horrified.

Jiang Cheng only manages a strangled,  _ “No.” _

You’re grinning from ear to ear. Is this a bad idea? Could be! But you’re really not sure how _ anyone  _ expected you to let your siblings go off into unknown territory like this without you being there to support them.

You are patient enough to wait until Jiang Cheng slams the plexiform privacy screen in front of the communications array shut before you say, “What’s the worst they do, send me home?”

According to Jiang Cheng, there’s  _ much  _ worse they could do, which starts with executions and gets steadily more grisly. He’s starting to work himself up, pacing back and forth in the shuttle, and he ignores you when you try to tell him he’s wrong.

Eventually more quietly, shijie says, “They might turn us all away.”

That— is a possibility you hadn’t  _ really  _ considered, because, “No, no, why would they? I’m not disrupting anything, and I’m not going to be a Lyctor. They won’t even notice me!”

“How did you even get this far?” Jiang Cheng demands. “Someone would have scanned the shuttle at takeoff, precisely because they’re trying to  _ prevent  _ this kind of  _ idiotic stunt—”  _

You explain yourself and your bones, which means Jiang Cheng gets to yell at you more about how this is a waste of effort, working out a theorem for something with literally no use except getting into _ exactly this sort of trouble, Wei Wuxian. _

The fight takes  _ some time,  _ even with shijie there to mediate. She’s not happy with you either, but she’s much more calm about it— Though her brand of quiet disappointment is harder to shamelessly ignore than Jiang Cheng’s angry worrying.

You honestly don’t think your presence matters one way or another. You’d be surprised if any of the  _ other  _ Houses took that ‘no servants, no retainers’ thing seriously. But, you are tragically alone in holding that position. You think that all you’ll have to deal with is a nasty scolding, perhaps a little confinement or punishment, nothing to worry about. On the other hand, shijie thinks all three of you will be turned away from the planet, while Jiang Cheng thinks that one, you’ll be  _ lucky  _ if the First kills you quickly, and two, he’d be glad to help them out.

It’s cute when he worries about you like that, but you really, really don’t think it’s necessary. Unfortunately, you’re outnumbered, and when your siblings start seriously discussing whether they can ask the remote pilot to turn the shuttle around and deposit you back at home, you realize you need to do something.

“Fine,  _ fine.”  _ You groan and slump back in your seat. You’re starting to get a headache from listening to the other two argue back and forth over your head. “No servants, no retainers. Fine. What if… the Third sent two adepts.”

Jiang Cheng frowns at you. “Then the Third House looks like it’s trying to gain an advantage over the others.”

“Aren’t we, though? Isn’t everyone?”

Shijie gives you a reproachful look. You don’t  _ really  _ think you deserve that, but it’s still hard to take from her. You add, “Or we’re just offering the Emperor his choice of servants. Giving the Houses his complete trust in selecting immortal companions is a bit much, don’t you think? Would you really  _ want  _ to meet the Eighth House’s favorite child?”

She says, “Necromancers from two separate families… it will be too much. Even if the First doesn’t object, I think most of the other Houses will.”

“The Second, certainly,” Jiang Cheng adds. “Sixth. Eighth.”

You jolt upright. “Then we _ didn’t  _ send necromancers from two families,” you breathe.

Jiang Cheng catches on first. You know, because he visibly winces.

Shijie is just a moment behind him. “A-Xian,” she begins, and glances at Jiang Cheng.  _ “No.” _

“It makes sense!” you say. “Look at you, a matched set, the pride of the Third House. How could your parents choose just one of you to represent the House before the Emperor?”

“This is a terrible idea,” Jiang Cheng says. His eyes are tightly closed and he rubs at the bridge of his nose. “This is the worst idea you’ve ever had. You’re made of terrible ideas, but today, you’ve somehow managed to top yourself.”

Shijie reproachfully says, “A-Cheng has been preparing for this for months.”

Ah. Now it’s your turn to wince. But you recover and say, “Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy to let him have all the glory! Just imagine how ashamed the other Houses will be, watching their best cavalier primary lose to a Third House adept in hand-to-hand combat. I won’t need to do anything at all, I’ll just lie around and watch Jiang Cheng have all the fun.”

The trip is so short that nothing really gets  _ resolved  _ by the time you make it to your destination. The House of the First is bright outside the shuttle window you’ve pressed your face against, taking up more than half the sky. You’re still too far away to make out many details, but you do know this is an absolutely  _ ludicrous  _ amount of water for a single planet to have. You love it already.

You’re doing your best not to fidget, with limited success. There are other shuttles lining up with you in orbit above the planet, but none of the others are making any move to descend yet. What’s everyone waiting for?

Before you can ask that question out loud, Jiang Cheng slides open the plex privacy screen and says, “How long until we land?”

“The First House is scanning the craft, Your Grace. We’ll be given permission to continue once they’ve cleared us.”

Shijie reaches past him to close the screen again. She folds her hands in her lap, serene and peaceful, but you can see how tense she is. Looking out another window, she says, “This isn’t everyone, is it?”

Jiang Cheng crowds into your window, both of you jostling for space as you count shuttles. Shijie is right. Counting you, this is… six shuttles. Six out of eight. You’re a little impressed, despite yourself. Would a quarter of the Houses really have ignored a direct request from the Emperor?

Your brother says, “Are they late…?”

“Even from the Ninth, the flight here would be less than an hour. Right?” You look over at shijie just long enough for her to nod. “Unless someone is flying back from a Cohort posting, there shouldn’t have been any serious delays.

“Who do you think is missing?” Jiang Cheng asks.

Speculation keeps you busy for a little while. There’s only one shuttle to the left of yours and four to the right, so your best guess is that you’re in House order. Which, boring, but the Second House is  _ way  _ too dull to do something interesting like refuse a request from the Emperor anyways, so you can just argue about which of the other Houses might have dug their heels in. Pretty much the only thing you all agree on is that if anyone was likely to have abstained, it would have been the Ninth House.

Finally, the shuttle to your left starts to sink down towards the planet. A few minutes later, the one to your right follows it. Then the next one. You still haven’t moved.

The atmosphere is… noticeably tense. That’s your fault, honestly, but it’s not like you can do anything about it  _ now.  _

Shijie slides up the plexiform privacy screen and asks, “Is there a problem?”

The pilot says, “There appears to be an anomaly with your ship, Your Grace. You’ll be cleared for landing as soon as it’s resolved.”

_ Very  _ quickly, she shuts the screen again. Both of your siblings are looking at you, and you perhaps feel very  _ slightly  _ guilty.

Jiang Cheng asks, “Can you do the trick with the bones again?”

Shijie shakes her head. “Not a second time. And we’re still too far outside the planet’s halo—”

“And they already know something is wrong,” you add reluctantly.

There’s strained silence for a long moment.

You’re trying to figure out just how hard you’ll have to apologize for them to let your siblings onto the planet when an idea occurs to you. “...How likely do you think it is that the Ninth didn’t send a representative?”

“There are more important things happening right now,” Jiang Cheng snaps.

Shijie studies you more closely, but only says, “A-Xian.”

You spread your arms wide. “What do you think is a better option? Did the Third send two adepts to become Lyctors? Or… was the Third gracious enough to give a lift to a Ninth House cavalier?”

Both of them stare at you without speaking. You smile, and wait for them to think it through.

Faintly, Jiang Cheng says, “I was wrong. You found an idea even more terrible than the last one.”

“Come on,” you tell him. “You don’t really want to pretend not to be a cavalier, right? Lady Yu handed down her sword and chain and everything. What, do you want to sit in a classroom and learn about corpses after all? Because you probably should have thought about that years ago and saved  _ piles  _ of family fights.”

Shijie is still watching you. “A Ninth House necromancer,” she says. “Not a cavalier. You  _ aren’t  _ a cavalier, A-Xian.”

You spread your hands wide. “I’m not here to be a Lyctor. Besides, how many people will be here who know our family? If I’m a cavalier, nobody needs to care about me, but if I’m an adept, then the Third House is just trying to seize more than their fair share of influence, right?”

Jiang Cheng says, “I could break his legs and leave him tied up here and  _ pay  _ for the shuttle to take him home.”

Shijie says, “You don’t have a rapier, or an offhand, or— Will they even let a cavalier onto the planet without their adept?”

“Only one way to find out. Stop me if you have any better ideas?”

They aren’t happy, but they don’t say anything, and you’re the only shuttle still left in orbit. So you reach out and raise the privacy screen again.

“Sorry, sorry, I think I understand what the anomaly is. This is Wei Wuxian, son of Cangse Sanren, Reverend Daughter of the Ninth House. The Reverend Mother sent me as the House’s cavalier primary, as requested.”

You and your siblings all hold your breath. If the Ninth  _ did  _ send their own representatives, this is all going to blow up in your face. You leave the privacy screen open, ready to either talk fast or to take full blame for your presence, whichever, but there’s no reply for a full minute. But then, without warning, the pilot’s voice says, “Approaching the First House,” and the shuttle’s thrusters kick on and you begin to sink towards the planet.

All three of you shift in place as you feel yourselves enter the planet’s halo. It’s not like you even need to  _ do  _ anything right now, but having the thanergic energy there for the taking… it’s a relief. 

Shijie shakes herself, then turns to you. “What are you going to do for a weapon?”

Jiang Cheng says, “I have extras. Mom— She insisted. Come on, at least get a rapier on before you embarrass yourself in front of the First.”

He opens a trunk and starts rummaging. You look over his shoulder. There are at least five rapiers in this one trunk, plus miscellaneous other weaponry, and you’d say there are good odds that there are more weapons in the other trunks.

Jiang Cheng shoves a rapier into your chest until you take it from his hands. “An offhand,” he says.

“Sword and knife,” says shijie. She looks at you with worried eyes. “That would be easiest, wouldn’t it? I know you’re good, A-Xian, but we’ll be dealing with the best cavaliers the other Houses have to offer.”

“No,” you say thoughtfully. You turn the rapier over in your hands before reaching down and strapping it to your waist. “I think… sword and pannier.”

Your siblings stare. Jiang Cheng is the first to speak. “You’re— What is  _ wrong  _ with you today?” 

“No, no, it makes sense. Who but a Ninth cavalier would fight sword and  _ pannier?  _ I even have bones to load them up with. I’m going to be the most Ninth cavalier any of them have ever seen.”

“I don’t want you to get hurt,” shijie says.

You laugh. “Me? It’ll be fine. What would they even do to me? I’ll be a joke, maybe, but I’ll be a  _ hilarious  _ joke.”

They’re out of time to argue with you. You get shijie to promise to help you cut up some clothing and sew a decent excuse for a pannier tonight, once you get a little privacy, and by then, your shuttle is landing. 

—

You recognize a number of the people scattered across the landing field, but you’re too busy looking at the First House to focus on them. It’s not like any place you’ve ever visited. The building you’ve arrived at is magnificent, honestly. It’s a  _ palace  _ more than anything else, absolutely massive, made of white shining stone like nothing you’ve ever seen before. It is kind of a shame that you count at least half a dozen collapsed towers, or that the walls are so overgrown that you aren’t actually  _ sure  _ how much of them has fallen down.

You’re leaning forward to tell Jiang Cheng to make a bet on whether or not the floors are still intact, but before you can speak, he turns to shijie with a frown. “That’s not Wen Qing.”

It isn’t, it turns out. All three of you stare across the courtyard at the Second House representatives. Shijie doesn’t frown, but she looks worried. You’re not sure who the Second would even send if  _ not  _ Wen Qing, but you’d have recognized her, even from this distance.

You venture, “Is that… Wen Chao?” It is, isn’t it. What a  _ waste. _

But the three of you don’t have time to discuss it any further, because a short little priest in pristine white robes is bustling over towards you, smiling from ear to ear.

“Hail to the Lady of the Third House,” he calls.” And hail to her cavalier!”

Shijie inclines her head towards him, smiling. “Hail to the First House,” she replies. “Hail to the Undying Emperor.”

Jiang Cheng is trying painfully hard not to look at you, and he’s a  _ little  _ too far away for you to discreetly kick him. So all you can do is brace yourself and wait for the priest to turn to you.

Now there’s a worried frown creasing his face. “Hail to the Ninth House,” he says. “Hail, of course— But my dear boy, where is your adept?”

You look once around the courtyard, then back at the priest, letting confusion and a  _ hint  _ of worry into your expression. Jiang Cheng is scowling and looks like he’s biting the inside of his cheek. You really are going to kick him later, but you need to take care of this first. You say, concerned, “He’s not here already?”

The priest shakes his head. “No, no— Everyone has landed, I’m afraid. That is, everyone who arrived. We seem to have lost contact with the Seventh House’s shuttle— But that’s neither here nor there. In fact, we didn’t hear from the Ninth House at all. We had no idea we were to expect you.”

“Ahh.” You nod knowingly. “I’m afraid the Reverend Mother doesn’t care to communicate with the other Houses if she can help it.”

The priest nods along with you, as if you’ve said something sensible. And it’s common knowledge that the Ninth ignores the other Houses as thoroughly as possible, but despite yourself, you’re still impressed that they would ignore a message from the Emperor himself.

You add, “I’ve been visiting family in the Third, but I expected to meet the Reverend Son Yanling Daoren here at the First House.”

Shijie steps up to your side and takes your wrist in one hand. She looks perfectly serene, with just a hint of sympathy and worry, but she gives you a warning squeeze. You subside. That’s probably enough detail, and more will just make you look suspicious.

The priest doesn’t question you any further, remarkably. All he does is tell all of you to call him  _ Teacher,  _ tells you that everyone will gather later, but for now to follow the servants to your quarters, and then he bustles off as quickly as he arrived. Shijie’s hand is still locked around your wrist, and after a moment, Jiang Cheng steps over to stand at your other side.

“I’m going to murder you,” he says, conversationally.

—

Shijie looks down at her work with a frown. Doubtfully, she says, “It’s not the best work I’ve ever done, but it should be durable enough.”

The panniers look fine to  _ you.  _ She took one of your brother’s robes, cut it up, and started stitching bits together while you still would have still been busy trying to pick out what clothing to sacrifice. 

Jiang Cheng comes up behind you to look over your shoulder. “Too plain. You should have used something more ornate.”

“You do know you aren’t getting this back, right?” you ask. “This isn’t going to rematerialize as a piece of clothing after I’m done with it.”

He just gives you an unimpressed look, twitches one shoulder, and goes back to moving things between trunks.

Shijie says, “If I want it to match A-Xian’s clothing, I don’t have many options. Neither of us brought much black clothing. And if you’re giving him your other clothes, there’s even less to choose from.”

“What?” You haven’t been paying enough attention to Jiang Cheng. When you turn to  _ properly  _ look at what he’s doing, he’s emptied out one of their trunks and is refilling it with— “Jiang Cheng, I’m not going to steal your things, put those back.”

He ignores you! This is why he’s a terrible little brother. The worst, honestly.

“Don’t forget to give him a few rapiers, in case something happens to his,” shijie says. Your whole family is conspiring against you.

To distract yourself from this betrayal, you turn back to the panniers. “I have an idea. Hand me a few bones? Doesn’t matter which ones, they should be in that trunk just on your other side—” 

Shijie plucks a few ribs from the trunk and hands them to you. You have to concentrate, because this is a little more complicated than simple reconstruction, but the bone is cooperative, and you’ve always been good at this. It doesn’t take you too long to work out a good scaffolding of bone to support the fabric of one bag, and then the other. When you hold one up, the bone is perfectly snug against the fabric, not too tight and not too loose, and the off-white of the bone makes a striking contrast with the dark background.

You hold the bag out for the others to admire. “Isn’t that the most Ninth thing you’ve ever seen?”

Jiang Cheng almost manages to sound approving. “It’s tasteless,” he says. “Very Ninth.”

—

When you make your way down to the common room, the only other house there so far is the Eighth. You hang back for a moment, trying to see if you can guess who they are. But— it’s no good, you decide, and give it up. The Eighth isn’t quite as reclusive as the Ninth, but they sure are doing their best. You never visited Eighth House, and nobody from their House and your approximate generation has visited Third, as far as you know.

Besides, what everyone  _ does  _ know is that Eighth House is universally allergic to fun. It’s a tragic situation, but it’s basically in their genetics at this point. 

Anyways, the adept and cavalier are both wearing veils, so even if they have been in the line of succession since you were little, there’s not even a passing chance you’d recognize them from some old lesson. At least they’re color coded. The adept is dressed all in white and the cavalier is all in black, so if they manage to keep that consistent, you won’t even have to check for a rapier to tell who’s who.

Since it’s been like two whole minutes and nobody else has arrived yet and there’s only so much boredom one man can be expected to handle, you go ahead and introduce yourself. The veil situation is really not ideal for making eye contact and smiling charmingly, but once they’re up close, the veils are translucent enough to tell  _ about  _ where things are placed (and besides, your smiles are charming enough to make up any shortfalls in the eye contact department).

“Xiao Xingchen,” says the one in white, quietly. “Heir to the House of the Eighth.”

That’s the adept sorted, then. But you’re going to be dealing much more with the cavalier, so you turn to the one in black and ask, “And you?”

The cavalier doesn’t say a word, or… move, really, but Xiao Xingchen says, “My cavalier primary, Song Zichen. Forgive the discourtesy, but my cavalier has taken a vow of silence and is unable to speak for himself.”

There’s a hint of a smile in his tone, so you don’t feel too badly about saying, “A vow of silence? I have to assume that makes it difficult to work together, doesn’t it?”

The smile comes through even more clearly now, despite the veil. “It’s remarkable what a person can get used to, given proper motivation. He and I have… our ways.”

You don’t get much more out of him, but that’s fine, because the other houses start arriving in the room. You recognize most of the other faces, even if there’s varying degrees of  _ friendship  _ involved. When Nie Huaisang and his giant cavalier brother walk into the room, you head  _ straight  _ to his side to greet him as enthusiastically as possible. He seems fairly delighted to see you, and you politely ignore the skeptical looks his brother is giving you over his head. When your siblings arrive, you corral them in to say hello to the Fourth as well, and manage to even herd the whole group over to the table so you can sit together as the other Houses drift in and take their own seats and skeleton servitors begin serving the evening meal.

—

“Everyone knows that the Ninth survives on strays, these days,” you tell Nie Huaisang, across the table. “And they never formally gave up their original claim to me. Third has a claim as well, but in the Ninth, my mother had been in the line of succession, so they  _ insisted…”  _

Nie Huaisang nods sympathetically, his face half-hidden behind a fan. His brother looks  _ much  _ more skeptical, but he’s not part of the conversation, so you ignore him. Nie Huaisang says, “But… you’re the Ninth’s  _ cavalier,  _ not its adept? I know we were young when we talked about it, but I thought for certain—” 

You’re expecting to have to repeat this conversation half a dozen times or so, so it’s good to get some practice in. You shrug carelessly. “Doesn’t every child want to be an adept when they grow up? No, no, I’m a humble man—” Beside you, Jiang Cheng snorts. “—and I know how to be content with my lot. Hey, tell your brother that he and I should fight later! You can call it for us, and we can have a real sparring match!”

Nie Mingjue can clearly hear you, but he doesn’t answer, only gives you a deeply, deeply skeptical look.

You lean forward and grin at Nie Huaisang, and say in a mock-whisper, “He’ll come around, he just never got to get to know me when I visited the Fourth.”

Jiang Cheng grabs your arm and hauls you back into your own seat. “That was also a decade ago, and you were a literal child. Besides, you’re even more annoying now than you were then.”

As the conversation around you moves on, Jiang Cheng hesitates, leans closer, and speaks so quietly you can barely hear him. “You’re  _ certain  _ you never brought up your studies in any of your correspondence? If my mother told anyone—” 

You speak as quietly as him. “When have I ever remembered to answer a letter in my whole life? Besides, Lady Yu would never talk about  _ me  _ if she had the option of discussing either of you instead.

Past Jiang Cheng, shijie notices the two of you talking and gives you a quick, tense smile. You return the smile, easily, and she goes back to making conversation with the Fifth.

Jiang Cheng still looks worried, so you give him a reassuring pat on the arm and say, “As long as I stay away from the classes, or rituals, or whatever they’re going to make the others work on, what does it matter? We should just relax and have fun while all the adepts are busy studying.”

—

After everyone has finished their meal and skeletons have carried away the remaining dishes, one of the priests stands and announces, “Now let us pray for the lord of that which was destroyed, remembering the abundance of his pity, his power, and his love.”

It’s a familiar routine.  _ “Let the Emperor Undying, ransomer of death, scourge of death, vindicator of death, look upon the Nine Houses and hear their thanks…”  _

As the prayer ends, everyone relaxes back into their seats. But then Teacher turns and gestures at  _ you  _ and says, “As we have an unexpected guest, might we ask the devout of the Locked Tomb to favor us…?”

You’re frozen for a long moment. Jiang Cheng mostly manages to hide his horrified expression as he looks at you, and shijie ducks her head, hands tightly folded in her lap. You slowly rise to your feet,  _ completely  _ prepared to make something up out of thin air. But an ancient memory unearths itself from somewhere in the back of your mind, your mother holding your hands out to the sides of your body, palms up, coaxing you through the words of a prayer. 

You hold your hands outstretched, and even though you hardly know what you’re saying, you begin, _ “I pray the tomb is shut forever. I pray the rock is never rolled away…” _

At any given point, you have no idea what the next word out of your mouth is going to be, but somehow, you reach the apparent end of the prayer without any pauses or hesitations. Most of the faces you can see are either bored or blank, but your siblings look like they’re trying not to seem worried, and Xiao Xingchen watches you in an unsettlingly intent way, made extra unnerving by how little of his face you can see past his veil.

It’s a relief to sit again. The priests sigh happily at each other.

“Beautiful,” says one.

“And still unchanged,” adds another.

You don’t quite manage to relax until they finally move on.

—

Once the every house has received its mysterious little rings, Teacher dismisses you all, and everyone drifts slowly and uncertainly out of the room. Jiang Cheng and shijie have stopped for a moment, bending over their metal ring and studying it together. She’s saying something quiet to him that you can’t catch, but you’re not supposed to be looking like you’re here  _ with  _ them anyways,  _ so.  _

You look around, spinning your ring around one finger, and spot someone you haven’t greeted yet. 

“Lan Zhan!”

Jiang Cheng’s head shoots up when he hears that, and he tries to hiss something at you, but he’s  _ much _ too late to stop you. You’re already halfway across the room, waving cheerfully to Sixth House. Lan Xichen is in quiet conversation with Jin Guangyao, but he still takes the time to nod in greeting to you.

Lan Wangji has  _ no  _ excuse whatsoever to ignore you, though he still makes a valiant effort. You don’t let him get away with it. You cut across his path, grinning at him, so that his only options are to collide with you or to stop. He does slow down, but gives you the most impressively unimpressed look that you’ve ever seen.

You say, “Lan Zhan, imagine seeing you here! It’s been a long time, hasn’t it!”

It’s been… nine years? Maybe? It’s all from that same approximate period of time when your parents were trying to get your siblings introduced to the other Houses face to face, and you were allowed to go along for the ride. But Sixth House was  _ memorable,  _ because that was the one where the House nobility found you, personally, so disruptive that your visit was cut short by a good two months. 

You and Lan Zhan were practically attached at the hip for that whole visit! Admittedly, that wasn’t exactly his choice, it was his uncle’s. And you hadn’t been too happy with it either. But still! You’re pretty sure that with the two of you stuck in First House for the foreseeable future, that shared history  _ basically  _ makes you best friends.

“Move,” he says.

“Ah, Lan Zhan, you’re just like I remember. What have you been up to all these years? If I ever remembered to keep up with letters, I would have written to you every month for sure. How is Sixth House? Is it still like when I visited? Is it still boring? Do you—” 

In all fairness, you’re kind of asking for it. But the look on his  _ face!  _ How are you supposed to back off now and be all distant and polite? You think you saw him almost make an expression there! So you’re babbling away, not giving him time to answer any of the questions you’re asking, because that was never the point, obviously, and you ignore it when he raises one hand and reaches out to you.

You ignore it, until his fingers brush against your jaw, and you start to move right into how  _ bold  _ and how  _ forward  _ the young master of the Sixth House is— And your jaw locks tight and refuses to move. 

Lan Wangji says, “Mm.”

Then he steps around you and continues on his way.

You let him go, because you’re busy with poking at your mouth and trying to figure out what— It’s not that hard to tell  _ what  _ he did, but you’re still frozen in uncomprehending disbelief at what he  _ did.  _ Your teeth are fused together. Seriously? Seriously?? But yes seriously, you can  _ feel  _ it with your fingers, even if you weren’t able to feel it with your other senses.

You turn to Lan Xichen and get his attention, trying your  _ very  _ hardest to look mournful and not to burst out laughing instead. You gesture pitifully at your mouth, and he has the grace to wince.

“Wangji,” he calls after his brother (his brother ignores him). Lan Xichen sighs and turns to you and bows slightly, saying, “The Sixth apologizes, Ninth. It should be possible for any adept to reverse the spell. I’m sure—” He hesitates for a moment. “I’m sure Wangji wouldn’t leave it in place for long. But it may be… easier to ask the Third for assistance.”

That’s fair. You bow to him and make a solemn-sounding noise, then head back to your siblings and grin, waiting for them to notice.

Shijie spots it first and freezes, lifting one hand to cover her mouth. Jiang Cheng curses under his breath, then grabs you by the arm and definitely does  _ not  _ drag you out of the room. Shijie follows along, and when she reaches out to touch the back of Jiang Cheng’s arm, he slows down marginally, and his grip on your arm gets slightly looser. You do hear shijie sigh and feel perhaps a  _ little  _ tiny hint of guilt. Though honestly, who would ever have expected the heir of the Sixth House to react like  _ that?  _

Once you’re safely away from the others, you reach up to your own jaw with your free hand, trying to feel your way through what Lan Wangji did to you, so that you can undo it. It’s not too difficult, you don’t think. Teeth aren’t  _ exactly  _ like bones, but the basic principles are the same. 

But before you can do anything, Shijie takes you by the wrist. “Just hold on, A-Xian. When we get back to our rooms, I’ll take care of that.”

You take her warning, though you think she’s being unnecessarily cautious. Hardly anyone else had left the room by the time you made your exit, and First House is staffed by constructs, not  _ people _ . But you can afford to wait a few minutes longer, and entertain yourself by studying Lan Wangji’s work.

By the time shijie is closing and locking the door to their chambers, you’ve mostly figured it out. What’s most impressive is how  _ quickly  _ Lan Wangji was able to do the work. He barely even made contact with you. If he could do it at a distance, that would be even more impressive, but just this is impressive enough. Trying to undo his work takes you long enough that both your siblings have plenty of time to peer into your mouth and study your work as you detach your teeth.

Shijie still has to step in at the end to do the delicate finishing work, making sure all the tissue is back in order. You  _ mostly  _ had it right, but you can tell the difference in how well your mouth closes after she’s done.

The first thing you say is, “In my defense, I never thought I’d need to keep a mental map of how the surface of my teeth should feel.”

“That was stupid,” is Jiang Cheng’s only reply.

“It wasn’t! I was only trying to be polite and pay my respects to the Sixth, and this is how I was repaid—” 

“A-Xian,” says shijie. You cut yourself off and wait for her to go on. After a moment, she sighs and says, “Be careful. We don’t want to provoke anyone so early in our stay.”

“Me? No, no, Lan Zhan wasn’t upset, he and I are on great terms.”

Jiang Cheng says, “He hates you.”

You aren’t about to dignify  _ that _ with a response, so you turn to shijie instead. “Can you help me with my panniers?”

“Of course,” she says. “But do you need much else? I think they work well the way they are. I don’t think you need to do anything else if you’re reinforcing the fabric with bone.”

“The bone looks ridiculous,” Jiang Cheng adds. “It’s very… Ninth. You should keep them that way.”

Shijie asks, “Do you have enough small bones to fill the panniers? I didn’t get a good look at what was in your trunks, but you won’t be able to fit that many femurs in there without running out of room. If your bones are too large, A-Cheng and I will help you break them down.”

Jiang Cheng says, “You’re spoiling him,” but doesn’t argue. 

Most of your bones run small anyways, because it was easier to stuff your trunks full that way. Once you load up your panniers and feel how the weight really  _ settles _ , you have to laugh at how ridiculous it’s going to feel to  _ fight  _ like this. Of course, once you try to share how funny it is, Jiang Cheng  _ insists  _ you spar with him in the room to get used to it, so that you don’t embarrass yourself if Nie Mingjue takes you up on your offer of a fight.

So rude! It means you have almost no time for gossip at  _ all  _ before shijie starts gently insisting that no, you really do need to stay in the Ninth House’s rooms and not the Third’s, or something something you’ll undo all the work of convincing everyone that the Third isn’t making a play for more power. Fine, you  _ suppose.  _ But the whole adventure is much less fun when it’s just you following a construct through dark, worn-out hallways to an empty set of rooms. Constructs bring in your luggage and settle it into a corner (bones, bones, bones, and a few sets of clothing, plus whatever else is in the trunk Jiang Cheng packed for you). But once you’re moved in, you don’t have much to do but settle into the hilariously ancient bed, shut your eyes, and do your best to focus on sleep.


	2. Chapter 2

Shijie is gasping for air behind you, and there’s a wet note to each breath that makes you want to curl into a ball and cry. Your hands are shaking, but you focus on wedging phalanges around the door frame. You cut your palm to anoint the bones with blood, and set up the strongest ward you can muster.

When you turn around, Jiang Cheng is holding Shijie, tears rolling down his cheeks. You’ve been trying to hold yourself together, but it’s too much, suddenly, and you feel yourself crying too as you go to your knees beside them. The front of Shijie’s robe is so wet with blood it looks black. You reach out to her, desperate to help somehow, but your hands hover over her arms, helpless, and you’re afraid to even touch her. 

“Siphon from me,” Jiang Cheng says, abruptly. “You need the thalergy, you can’t heal yourself this way.”

Shijie’s face is tense with pain, but she still smiles so gently as she shakes her head.

“Then from me,” you say, begging. “Shijie, please.”

She takes two ragged, gasping breaths before she manages to speak. “A-Cheng, A-Xian, no. You need—” She has to stop for a moment, and struggles to draw an ugly, bubbling breath of air. “You already fought so hard. I need, I need you to stay safe.”

You’re struggling not to sob, and losing the fight. Jiang Cheng is curled over Shijie, his hair hanging in front of his face. Desperately, you say, “Let, let me go find Lan Zhan. He can fix this. I can—” 

Jiang Cheng snaps, “Lan Xichen was in the middle of that fight. Either Lan Wangji is grieving, or he doesn’t have thalergy to spare. You can’t expect him to come running when you call.”

“Then siphon just a little from each of us,” you beg, but Shijie is already weakly shaking her head. “Or I’ll try to find Lan Zhan anyways. But you have to promise not to die before I get back, okay? It’s a promise, you have to stay alive—” 

Your voice chokes off, because Shijie is reaching out to you with one unsteady, bloody hand. You clutch it helplessly, trying not to hold too tightly. Her fingers curl weakly around yours, and you can’t do anything but cry.

With her other hand, Shijie draws her ritual dagger from her sash and holds it out to Jiang Cheng. “A-Cheng, I know you understood,” a pause, while she gasps for air. “You understood the theorems.”

You don’t understand, but Jiang Cheng does. He stiffens, and shakes his head, refusing to take the knife. “A-Jie, no. No, no, no, you can’t, I can’t—”

She smiles, somehow. “I’m sorry, A-Cheng. I’m so sorry.” She has to pause to breathe again, and you can hear the way she’s choking on every breath. “Protect A-Xian for me. Protect each other.”

Then she plunges the dagger into her own stomach, and you finally understand. Jiang Cheng is sobbing now, still helplessly shaking his head. Shijie reaches up, cups the side of his face. She presses her bloody thumb between his lips. You think she’s trying to say something more, but she can’t manage to speak any longer.

You’re still holding Shijie’s hand, you couldn’t let go if you tried, but you reach out with your other hand to clutch at Jiang Cheng’s sleeve. It’s difficult to speak through the tears, but you beg, “Don’t let her go. You can’t, you can’t let her go.”

He still shakes his head, but past the grief and denial, you can see defeat on his face. You can’t feel exactly what he’s doing, only make guesses from what you learned from studying the theorems, but you can feel the thanergy he’s manipulating. You never got to see all of the theorems, but the— the shape of the process was clear enough. You knew he was strong and clever enough to fill in the gaps, but you didn’t want to put it to the test, not like this. You feel like you should be encouraging him somehow, supporting him, but all you can do is cling to his sleeve with one hand and Shijie’s body with the other.

When Shijie’s hand starts to fall, Jiang Cheng reaches up to hold it to his cheek. He’s weeping, still. You can feel it when he finishes the process, because all the loose thanergy swirling in the air suddenly vanishes into his body. Nothing about him seems different. But the room feels… normal, somehow. Not like a room where a person just died, even though you still can’t look away from Shijie’s body.

Jiang Cheng moves, finally. Though all he does is lean forward to lay Shijie down on the floor and fold her hand across her chest. Belatedly, you follow him, placing her other hand on her chest as well. It’s a struggle to let go. Even if she’s not— Even if she’s not there any longer, you can’t manage to accept that she’s gone.

But your brother is still here. You let go of his sleeve so you can put your hand on his shoulder instead, and try to force an encouraging expression onto your face, though you can’t stop your mouth from twisting in an ugly, painful way.

It doesn’t matter. The moment your hand touches Jiang Cheng’s shoulder, he flinches away. 

_ “Dont,”  _ he manages, and then stops for a moment, breathing hard.

When he finally looks at you, it’s your turn to flinch. And when you meet his eyes— There’s something wrong with them, though it takes you a moment to recognize your sister’s eyes in your brother’s face. You don’t try to touch him again, and you look away, your eyes skidding past Shijie’s body until you can stare off into the far corner of the room.

“How could you?” Jiang Cheng demands, bitter and accusing. “How could you do that to her? To me?”

You want to protest that it wasn’t your fault, that you couldn’t have known there was anything wrong with Eighth House, and how were you supposed to know that Xiao Xingchen wasn’t who he claimed to be— But you can’t bring yourself to say any of that. It feels too much like a lie.

Instead, you just bow your head and wait for Jiang Cheng to say everything he needs to say.

He doesn’t say anything more, though. There’s a horrible silence for a long, drawn out moment, like he expects you to be able to argue with a single thing he’s just said. Then abruptly, he shoves his way upright and storms past you and out the door.

You start to warn him about the wards, but before you can force the words from your throat, he’s already broken through them, apparently without a thought. You turn just in time to watch the bones around the door crumble to dust as he leaves the room. He doesn’t even hesitate for a moment. You turn back to Shijie’s body, a part of you trying to smile with pride and a part of you wanting nothing more than to curl up next to Shijie and weep.

Eventually, you force yourself to arrange Shijie’s body with the dignity she deserves. Her robes are sticky with blood, which you determinedly ignore until she’s laid out properly, her face blank and peaceful, her eyes closed, her hands folded neatly over her chest. You wipe her face clean before you force yourself to stand and go. You don’t want to leave her like this, alone, but Jiang Cheng has whatever is left of her soul, and even if he doesn’t want to see your face, there are other people left here, still alive.

You find Lan Zhan in the atrium. His sleeves are soaked in blood and the edges of his inner robes are stained pink with blood sweat, but he seems calm and collected, which makes one of you.

His eyebrows  _ visibly  _ rise when he sees you, so you must look even worse than you feel. He begins, “Wei Ying, what—” 

You cut him off, shaking your head. You can keep going right now, because you have to. But you’re only going to manage to keep going if, and you cannot stress this strongly enough, you don’t have to talk about or think about anything that just happened. Later. You’ll have time to properly collapse later.

For a moment you hesitate, but you ask, “Your brother…?”

But the instant you get a look at Lan Zhan’s face, you wave him off. You aren’t going to force anyone else to answer a question like that either. “Sorry, sorry,” you tell him. “You don’t need to say it.”

You look around the atrium, blinking blearily. Your eyes still ache, and you were running on fumes even before before— 

“Is it over?” you ask. “Are we taking a break to rest before we go back to killing each other?”

“He’s coming,” Lan Zhan says, quiet and abrupt. 

You follow his gaze to the far side of the room. You still haven’t heard whatever it is that caught his attention, but the Eighth House’s cavalier makes his appearance in the doorway, with his necromancer right on his heels.

If Lan Xichen is gone, the least you can do is make sure Lan Zhan isn’t left helpless. You step between him and Song Zichen’s body, drawing your rapier with one hand, and loosening the tops of your panniers with the other.

You call out, “So, what is your name? Is it really Xiao Xingchen?”

The adept laughs and reaches up to untie the veil around his eyes. He takes his time undoing it, then carelessly tosses the cloth to the side. He looks you up and down one more time, then says, “Xue Yang. Unfortunately, Xiao Xingchen didn’t survive his trip to Canaan House.”

“Xue Yang? Is that an Eighth family?”

You glance sideways at Lan Zhan, who minutely shakes his head.

Xue Yang laughs again, more contemptuously this time. “I have no love for the Ninth, and the Ninth certainly has no love for me, but even I can tell that the Reverend Mother would be ashamed of you.”

“What—?” A flicker of a smile is all the warning you get before Song Zichen lunges for you. He’s completely silent, which is honestly less unsettling now that you know he is, technically, dead, but it doesn’t make him any easier to fight. 

You parry and riposte, but he’s fast. Even faster than he was before. You’re a  _ little  _ busy just trying to keep up with him, but you’re almost certain that he’s moving in ways that aren’t compatible with a living, uninjured human body.

Right, you’re barely keeping up with him, and you’re pretty sure he’s only getting faster. You don’t have a decent offhand, and everyone knows you’re not just cavalier. You reach for a handful of bones and scatter them at Song Zichen’s feet. 

You’re dangerously tired, but reconstruction has always come naturally to you. A thicket of arms springs up around Song Zichen’s legs, clutching at his robes, his face stays empty and blank, but he lays into them with his rapier and buckler, shattering bone. But that’s fine, it’s given you time to raise two full skeletons. They engage him, grabbing at his arms while you try to close with your blade, but Song Zichen is still strong enough to parry your strike, and you only catch him with a glancing blow.

And from behind him, you hear Xue Yang’s voice. “That won’t do at all.”

Suddenly, your bones are fighting you. You keep control of them, obviously, you aren’t a  _ complete  _ amateur. But you have to focus to do that, and all of your focus is already taken up with fending off Song Zichen. You can feel yourself break out into a light blood sweat, and barely manage to parry Song Zichen’s next attack. Your vision blurs dangerously, but behind Song Zichen, you can see approaching skeletons that definitely aren’t yours.

Behind you, Lan Wangji says,  _ “Focus.”  _

Your bones are wrenched out of your control, but in a pleasantly surprising twist, they don’t make a single move to turn on you. The scattered arms on the floor rebuild themselves. And the two full skeletons disengage from Song Zichen and turn to face the approaching ranks of constructs.

You take the opportunity to attack Song Zichen, but he has more freedom to move now, and easily deflects your rapier. 

You ask Lan Zhan, “Can you steal Zichen the Eighth too?”

That’s more wishful thinking on your part than it is a serious question, but Lan Zhan takes a moment to consider before regretfully replying, “I cannot.” But you don’t even get the time to be properly disappointed before he says, “Give me more bones.”

If you weren’t so out of breath, that would make you laugh. You have to settle for grinning as you grab a handful of bones from one pannier and toss them out to the side. You can’t take a proper look, but you think Lan Zhan raises at least a dozen skeletons and sends them off to engage the First House servants. You’d ask Lan Zhan if he’s worried about exhausting himself, but right now, you’re much more worried that you’re going to disappoint him before he tires himself out.

And past the skeletons, you can see a person. You spare him one glance, and almost get stabbed for your trouble. But your heart sinks. “Lan Zhan—!”

“Yes,” he says.

You don’t have time to warn Lan Zhan, all you can do is throw another handful of bones right at Song Zichen. A scattering of limbs sprout from them, grabbing at his face, his throat, but then you don’t see what happens, because Song Zichen is shouldered aside, and Nie Mingjue is upon you.

With Song Zichen, you were mostly managing to hold your ground. With Nie Mingjue’s first attack, you can already tell that you’re going to lose this fight. He lunges with his rapier, then follows up the attack with a strike with his offhand. You dodge, barely, and grope blindly for a bone from your pannier, trying desperately to reshape it into a buckler. You aren’t managing to attack at all, only parry and dodge.

Nie Mingjue’s corpse attacks with an overhead blow with his offhand, and you don’t have any choice but to block. His knife shatters your makeshift buckler, and your arm too, for good measure. You’re still staggering, trying to recover, when you feel a sudden sharp burning in your stomach, and look down to see that he’s run you through.

“Ah,” you manage. He withdraws the sword, and before you can react, he punches you in the wound with his offhand and sends you staggering backwards.

_ “Wei Ying!” _

You’d like to tell Lan Zhan to run, but you’re fairly sure it won’t do any good, in the end. You struggle to stand, but you still go to one knee, pressing your hand to the wound in your stomach. You try to raise your rapier, try to manage  _ something  _ like a guard position, but it’s no good. Nie Mingjue’s corpse stands over you, and you don’t know why he hasn’t killed you already, but then you see Xue Yang picking his way through the scattered bones, smiling down at you. You really ought to collect yourself for some kind of last desperate attack,  _ something,  _ but you’re also fairly sure you’re about to lose consciousness.

Your panniers tear themselves open, and a wall of bones springs up between you and the other two. Oh. Nice. You want to congratulate Lan Zhan on a clever idea, but you’re also still having trouble staying upright, and would really, really like to pass out.

You feel a pair of hands seize you under the arms, dragging you backwards towards the wall. You try to tell Lan Zhan not to bother, that you’ll buy him time to run, but he doesn’t listen, possibly because you aren’t quite managing to form words. By the time he lays you down on the floor, all you can do is gasp for air, struggling to even think past the pain.

By the time you blink enough times to clear your vision, Lan Zhan is on your knees beside you. He has a knife drawn and is smearing blood onto the floor. The blood sweat is staining his robes pinker by the moment, and when he raises the thanergetic ward, it only gets worse.

You frown and after two failed attempts, manage, “Lan Zhan.”

He looks at you. “Wei Ying.”

You take a few breaths. Lying flat feels better than struggling to stand, unsurprisingly. But your left arm is definitely, definitely broken, and your stomach is bleeding profusely. “Now what?”

Lan Zhan doesn’t answer for a few long seconds. Then he says, “I will protect Wei Ying.”

You have to smile a little at the sentiment. It won’t do you much good, and you’ve already half-resigned yourself to that. Xue Yang isn’t attacking the barrier yet. But it’s only a matter of time. Lan Zhan must have already pushed himself to his limits, and you’re not doing any better. You don’t know if anyone else in the house is still alive. Jiang Cheng must be. Somewhere, he must be alive. He was only out of your sight for a few minutes, and he has Shijie with him, to protect him. At least there’s that.

Finally, Lan Zhan adds, “Xue Yang is not a Lyctor.”

You laugh, and then  _ profoundly  _ regret that decision. “Ah, Lan Zhan. I don’t think that’s going to save us right now.”

He looks down at you, and you’re in too much pain to decode whether that expression is disappointment, or something else altogether. 

Outside of the ward, Xue Yang comes to some kind of decision. He leans back against the far wall, with Song Zichen by his side, while the horde of constructs floods towards you and Lan Zhan. Nie Mingjue’s corpse slashes at the thanergetic barrier, and you wince a little, though the barrier holds. Lan Zhan looks completely unconcerned, but you can see the way his hands are beginning to shake with exhaustion. He didn’t stand up after setting the wards, and you aren’t certain that he can. Blood drips from his face, runs over his chin, falls to the floor.

The skeletons are too thick around the barricade for you to even see the rest of the room past all the bones. There’s only you and Lan Zhan, and the bodies climbing over each other and clawing at the barrier.

What else is there to be done? You say, “My sister is… gone.”

He looks at you, and doesn’t say a thing, but you think you know him well enough by now to recognize what sympathy looks like on his face.

You force a smile and add, “But my brother will live forever, I guess, so at least I can stop worrying so much about him.”

Lan Zhan’s expression doesn’t change. But he reaches out with one hand to touch your shoulder.

Ah. You have to look away from him to get yourself under control again. “Your brother and my sister, hm?” You can’t look at Lan Zhan right now. You reach into your sleeve and find your working knife. “Lan Zhan, I think I’m about to do something very unkind to you. But if you don’t take advantage of it, it will have all been a waste. Do you understand?”

He must be exhausted, because he’s slow to realize. By the time horrified comprehension dawns upon his face, you’ve already drawn the knife across your throat.

You can’t speak, and your vision is going dim, but you see him, bending over you, his eyes fixed desperately on your face, calling your name.

—

“Lan Zhan,” he calls you. “Lan Zhan.”

You don’t respond. You don’t remember how.

Wei Ying’s voice is soft and coaxing. “Lan Zhan, there will be time later. Plenty of time. But right now, I need you to stand up. Will you stand up? For me?”

Somehow, you manage to rise to your feet. You still can’t look away from the— from— from him.

He says, “You remember how to talk, right? You can talk? I know we didn’t get time to do much research, about how much you get of me, but it doesn’t  _ seem  _ like you ought to get a new voice. But I’m not sure why you’d get new eyes either, so what do I know—” 

“Wei Ying.” Your voice is thick and choked.

“Oh.” He hesitates. Very gently, he continues, “You don’t need to worry about talking right now. But… get your sword up. The barrier is about to go down.”

You’re not sure how you manage to tear your eyes away from him. Nie Mingjue’s corpse claws at the thanergetic barrier, the repurposed skeletons of the First House crowding around and behind him. Distantly, you’re aware that your blood sweat has stopped, that there’s a fresh, glowing heat embedded deep in your stomach. You realize that right now, it would hardly take a thought to rebuild all of Canaan House with floors and walls of pure thanergy. But you stare at your barrier a moment too long, struggling to remember why it… matters, why you should care about holding it in the first place.

The bodies behind it break through, piling in towards you in a wave of bone and flesh. You blink once, and see that the theorems holding them together are so basic, so simple, so  _ fragile,  _ and it hardly takes a thought to pull them all loose. Between one breath and the next, the constructs begin falling to pieces. Nie Mingjue lasts the longest, with his soft tissue still there to hold his bones together. But when he takes his next step, his leg buckles and he falls to the ground, though he still tries to claw his way towards you. You look up from his rapidly dissolving corpse to see Wen Chao and Wen Zhuliu behind the collapsing skeletons, still attempting to reach you, but they’re hardly more intact than Nie Mingjue is. Within moments, the space before you is empty of everything but scattered bones and unspeakable fluids.

“Lan  _ Zhan,”  _ Wei Ying says admiringly. “Just look at you! Right, so, next—”

With a struggle, you find your voice. “I cannot.”

“You  _ definitely  _ can. Did you just see what you did right there? With your brilliance  _ and  _ my brilliance in a single package, we’re going to be absolutely unstoppable.”

“I  _ cannot.” _

There’s a hesitation. His voice is very gentle. “You already did the hardest part. But the rest still needs to happen. I’m not sure how long we have before I fade away, so I need you to take care of it before I’m gone, okay?” There’s a pause, and then he speaks again. “Oh, Lan Zhan. Don’t cry.”

You are not able to oblige him. You attempt to step forward, and nearly collapse. You aren’t certain how much of that can be attributed to simple physical exhaustion and how much of it is for other reasons. But before you can fall, you feel hands at your shoulders, supporting you. There’s a presence at your back, steadying you and urging you forward. 

Step by step, you let Wei Ying guide you through the field of fallen bones. By the time you’re back on open ground, you feel nearly able to support your own weight. But he keeps nudging you forward, and you can’t leave— When you try to turn and look behind you, he doesn’t let you.

“You don’t want to do that right now, Lan Zhan. Later. There will be plenty of time later.”

You want to argue, but your throat is closed too tightly for speech.

The corpse of Song Zichen steps out in front of you, sword drawn, and Wei Ying’s grip tightens on your shoulders. Xue Yang is close behind him, with a sword in his hand as well, still smiling. 

Wei Ying’s hand slides down your right arm, raises it. “Sword up,” he says. “Come on, I know you know what a good guard position looks like. We need to figure out a good offhand for you before I go. Knife would be good, I think, but I’m tempted to bully you into pannier—”

Your hand shakes, and Wei Ying steadies you.

“Sorry, sorry. Focus. You have this, Lan Zhan.”

You don’t need the sword for Song Zichen. You look at him now, frozen at the leading edge of decay, his soul so lightly tethered to his body, and wonder how you ever mistook him for something living. You sever those last bindings, and his body crumples to the ground as his spirit bursts free.

But before it can escape, Xue Yang catches it, gathers it in. Your eyes focus on him, and now, you see the ghosts that circle him, unable to break free of his orbit.  _ Revenants,  _ is your first thought, before you reject it. A revenant is tied to this world by its own regrets and resentment. These have been bound here by Xue Yang. You recognize Jin Zixuan. The Second House. Your brother. Xue Yang’s smile grows wider as he watches you studying him.

And yet— You force yourself to find your voice. “You are not a Lyctor.”

He laughs. His voice is light and mocking. “So perceptive! Truly, you do justice to your reputation.”

“Why?” He’s halfway through the process. Song Zichen’s spirit flutters weakly against his grasp, and you wait for him to open himself, just as you— You wait for him to open the connection to Song Zichen’s spirit, but he does not do so, and the critical moment passes. Instead, it settles into orbit around him with the other souls, captive but unabsorbed.

He watches you for a moment. “So perceptive, and you still can’t see this for the trap it is, can you? You can’t consume more than one soul, if the theorems are right. Why would I take in the first stray to cross my path? Who on this planet deserves to be a part of  _ me?” _

“The Emperor is coming,” you tell him.

“Good,” he says, with some satisfaction. He pauses, and his smile becomes a little sharper. “You know, I’m really not sure how hard it will be to remove a Lyctor’s spirit, when it’s all said and done. It’s good there are a few spares lying around. I ought to get some practice in before it  _ counts, _ and really… I think I’ll be the least bothered if something goes wrong with you.”

“Lan Zhan,” Wei Ying says. He raises your sword arm, and with his left hand he swings you around into a proper guard position.

Xue Yang doesn’t make a move on you yet, but he begins to circle you, watching you with a speculative, predatory smile. He swings his rapier carelessly as he walks, but Wei Ying doesn’t relax. You feel an ugly thanergetic hum in the air, and realize that he’s siphoning from the souls he’s tied to himself. You want to sever those links, but Wei Ying is tense behind you, his hands tight on your body, and you surrender yourself to his better judgment.

“He’s better with that sword than he’s pretending,” Wei Ying mutters in your ear. “Be ready, Lan Zhan. This might be about to hurt.”

When Xue Yang lunges, it comes faster than you would have thought possible. Wei Ying is ready and parries the first strike, then the second. But your body is blurry with exhaustion, and on the third strike, he gets past your guard. Wei Ying nearly manages to dodge, but before you realize what’s happening, Xue Yang has impaled your upper arm. It’s almost impossible to think past the sudden, burning pain, and it’s all you can do to hold onto your sword.

You hear Wei Ying cursing, calling your name, but you don’t answer him. You shrug off his hand on your shoulder and pivot, reaching towards Xue Yang with your uninjured arm. It feels like you’re struggling through water, and for a moment you think you’ll surely be too slow. But you see Xue Yang’s eyes as he notices what you’re doing, as he drops his sword and jumps back from you, and before he leaves your reach, your fingers brush against his sleeve.

It’s enough. Muscles, tendons, bones, and ligaments part beneath your hand. Xue Yang’s arm drops uselessly to his side, and fluid begins to drip from his sleeve. He’s still grinning, but it’s more fevered now, his eyes wild. The hum of the siphoning rises to a dissonant whine, and you nearly stumble. He could kill you right now without much trouble. But his sword is still lodged in your arm, and he’s breaking out into a blood sweat with the effort of siphoning so many souls at once. 

You look at him, and now you have the space to understand how he adapted the original theorems to do this. And how delicate the balance of it all is. It’s the simplest thing to reach out and knock one spirit out of alignment with the others. To channel a little thalergic energy into it, and watch as the constellation of souls wobbles out of orbit. Xue Yang tries to correct it, as blood begins to run freely from his nose and down over his chin. His eyes focus on you and he grins again, his teeth stained pink. He laughs once, his face filled with an emotion you can’t identify, and then the imbalance has grown too far for him to control and the feedback rebounds on him with a burst of sour, dark energy.

You hesitate just long enough to be sure the trapped souls are dissipating properly. You wish, bitterly, that you had any conception of what to say to your brother as he fades away. With your good hand, you pull Xue Yang’s rapier from your arm and let it drop from your hand. You reach into your sleeve for your ritual dagger, though your fingers are so numb that it’s difficult to grip it. And you go to one knee beside Xue Yang.

Blood bubbles up with every breath he takes, but he hasn’t stopped smiling. He’s dying. But you aren’t leaving this job unfinished. You give him enough time to speak, but he only watches you silently, as you kneel before him. You draw the dagger across his neck, and at the last moment he looks away from you, upwards, to where the last residual energy of the released spirits is fading. He laughs one last time, choked and wet, before he dies.

There’s the barest hint of a hand resting on your shoulder. A distant voice laughs and says, “Just as I’d expect of Lan Zhan.”

You somehow manage to struggle to your feet and turn, though you know there won’t be anyone there. “Wei Ying,” you beg.

Nobody answers you.

You must cross the courtyard, though you remember nothing of the trip. The next thing that you’re aware of is falling to your knees beside Wei Ying’s body. Your fingers find his wrist, searching for a pulse. You know it’s hopeless, but you can’t stop yourself. There’s still a faint smile on his face, and somehow, it manages to be more painful to look at than anything else has been. 

You ease him onto his back, as though his comfort matters right now, and fold his hands decorously across his chest. And then, uselessly, your fingers circle his wrist again, searching for even the smallest, slightest flutter of life. It aches to look at him, but it aches worse to look away. Time is passing, but you can’t force yourself to move. All you can do is sit there beside Wei Ying, still holding his wrist, hollow and helpless, simply watching him.

**Author's Note:**

> [Tumblr](https://spockandawe.tumblr.com/tagged/wuxian%20the%20ninth/chrono)/[Twitter](https://twitter.com/spockandawe/status/1270500019104350208)


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